Security

Did they read it?

Return receipts for email have been around for quite some time. They can be useful in some settings where a user is willing to verify that they've received an email without taking the time to compose a reply. However, the return receipt depends on the user's willingness to participate in the process. Often, for one reason or another, users do not wish to do that; these users can simply configure their email client to deny requests for return-mail receipts -- if, in fact, the user's email client supports that feature at all.

There are, however, those who aren't content to depend on voluntary responses. Rampell Software is peddling a subscription service for nosy correspondents who want to know whether or not their email has been read. Rampell is a company that pushes several spyware products for MacOS and Windows that are aimed at monitoring the use of other peoples' computers. The "DidTheyReadIt" service is aimed at people who are determined to know whether or not their mail has been read, and who are willing to pay for the privilege.

This, of course, has some not-so-pleasant implications for personal privacy. While the company assures its potential customers that it respects their privacy, nothing is said about the privacy of the recipient who may not wish to divulge whether or not they've read a particular email or where they've read it from. On the company's About Us page, they identify what kinds of people might want to find out whether an email has been read -- including some that make DidTheyReadIt sound like a must-have for potential stalkers:

It isn't particularly cheap to violate others' privacy either, at least not when using DoTheyReadIt on a regular basis. A quarterly subscription for the service, with the ability to track 500 messages per month, is $24.99.

To use the service, the user has to send email through DidTheyReadIt's servers by tacking ".didtheyreadit.com" onto the recipient's email address. DidTheyReadIt's server then tags the email with a "web bug" and sends it on its way to the intended recipient. For the uninitiated, web bugs are a well-known spammer trick to verify working email addresses. The spammer includes a bit of HTML in the email that will request an unique image name (usually a small image that is invisible to the reader) from a remote server that tracks the hits. The image name and email address are paired so that the spammer can identify working email addresses with users gullible enough to open the spammer's email. When the image is requested from didtheyreadit.com, a hit is logged and the sender can then view the information on the DidTheyReadIt website and/or be notified via email.

DidTheyReadIt takes the web bug idea further than the spammers do, however. It responds to the request for the web bug image by sending a slow stream of data back to the mail client; that stream will continue until the receiving system resets the connection. The amount of time the connection was allowed to run will be roughly equivalent to how long the message was on the reader's screen, giving a sense of how seriously the message was read.

When the service works, the amount of information provided to the sender is quite intrusive. Not content to simply verify that a user opened an email, DidTheyReadIt reports the number of times an email is read, how long the recipient spent reading it, when it was opened, the location of the reader, the IP address of the recipient at the time the message is opened and their ISP. Not only is the recipient (including anybody the message may be forwarded to) being monitored in their reading habits, they are also being physically tracked when the service is able to pair up a geographic location with an IP address. While it's not possible for the service to report a street address, it can narrow down the location to a city. It's easy to imagine scenarios where this would be particularly undesirable.

Users who are even moderately knowledgeable about the way that the Web works will have no problem blocking DidTheyReadIt from divining whether or not they have opened an email sent through this service. Rampell's claims of success "the vast majority of the time, upwards of 98% in extensive testing" are a bit suspect. In fact, many users are already protected by sane defaults in their mail clients that prohibit the display of remote graphics in HTML email by default.

This writer had to deliberately disable the defaults in the Yahoo! and SpamCop (which uses Horde) webmail clients to allow DidTheyReadIt to track test emails. The tracking did not work with Thunderbird or Opera's mail client. It goes without saying that users of mutt and Pine will easily slip under the radar.

Furthermore, once word gets around about this service, many users may simply opt to filter out email that passes through the DidTheyReadIt servers altogether. Some folks might also decide to play havoc with this service by writing scripts to call random images from DidTheyReadIt's servers to generate false positives and render the service useless. Ed Felten predicts that DidTheyReadIt will not succeed in the long run:

One would hope that the use of such a service would be considered "unacceptable" by most people already. Whether or not that is true, however, the use of free software for crucial tasks like email gives users the upper hand against this sort of service. There is, after all, nothing that forces us to tolerate a mail system which supports this kind of monitoring. If only all of our email problems were so easy to solve.

Comments (7 posted)

New vulnerabilities

firebird: Locally exploitable stack overflow

Package(s):	firebird	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 24, 2004	Updated:	May 26, 2004
Description:	A buffer overflow exists in three Firebird database binaries (gds_inet_server, gds_lock_mgr, and gds_drop) that is exploitable by setting a large value to the INTERBASE environment variable. An attacker could control program execution, allowing privilege escalation to the UID of Firebird, full access to Firebird databases, and trojaning the Firebird binaries. An attacker could use this to compromise other user or root accounts. See also this bug report.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-18 2004-05-23

Comments (none posted)

kernel: exploitable bug in the cpufreq code

Package(s):	kernel	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0228
Created:	May 24, 2004	Updated:	May 26, 2004
Description:	Brad Spender discovered an exploitable bug in the cpufreq code in the Linux 2.6 kernel.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2004:050 2004-05-21

Comments (none posted)

SquirrelMail cross site scripting vulnerabilities

Package(s):	squirrelmail	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0519 CAN-2004-0520 CAN-2004-0521
Created:	May 21, 2004	Updated:	October 4, 2004
Description:	Several unspecified cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities and a well hidden SQL injection vulnerability were found in SquirrelMail versions 1.4.2 and lower. An XSS attack allows an attacker to insert malicious code into a web-based application. SquirrelMail does not check for code when parsing variables received via the URL query string.
Alerts:	Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1733 2004-10-02 Conectiva CLA-2004:858 2004-08-12 Whitebox WBSA-2004:240-01 2004-06-21 Gentoo 200406-08 2004-06-15 Red Hat RHSA-2004:240-01 2004-06-14 Fedora FEDORA-2004-160 2004-06-09 Fedora FEDORA-2004-159 2004-06-09 Gentoo 200405-16:02 2004-05-25 Gentoo 200405-16 2004-05-21

Comments (none posted)

xpcd: buffer overflow

Package(s):	xpcd	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0402
Created:	May 24, 2004	Updated:	June 1, 2004
Description:	Jaguar discovered a vulnerability in one component of xpcd, a PhotoCD viewer. xpcd-svga, part of xpcd which uses svgalib to display graphics on the console, would copy user-supplied data of arbitrary length into a fixed-size buffer in the pcd_open function.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2004:053 2004-06-01 Debian DSA-508-1 2004-05-22

Comments (none posted)

Updated vulnerabilities

apache - denial of service in mod_ssl

Package(s):	apache	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0113
Created:	April 13, 2004	Updated:	May 25, 2004
Description:	A memory leak has been discovered in mod_ssl that may be triggered by sending normal HTTP requests to the Apache HTTPS port. An attacker can exploit this vulnerability to consume all memory available in the server, thus causing a denial of service condition. This problem has been fixed in Apache 2.0.49.
Alerts:	Fedora FEDORA-2004-117 2004-05-25 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:043 2004-05-10 Red Hat RHSA-2004:182-01 2004-04-30 Conectiva CLA-2004:839 2004-04-13

Comments (none posted)

apache: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	apache	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0993 CAN-2003-0020 CAN-2003-0987 CAN-2004-0174
Created:	May 12, 2004	Updated:	May 26, 2004
Description:	Versions of apache 1 through 1.3.30 include several minor vulnerabilities, including the writing of unescaped data to the error log file, a denial of service vulnerability, and a parsing failure in Allow/Deny rules on big-endian, 64-bit platforms. See the apache 1.3.31 announcement for details.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-22 2004-05-26 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:046-1 2004-05-20 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:046 2004-05-17 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0027 2004-05-13 Slackware SSA:2004-133-01 2004-05-12 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.021 2004-05-12

Comments (none posted)

cvs: heap overflow

Package(s):	cvs	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0396
Created:	May 19, 2004	Updated:	June 11, 2004
Description:	CVS (through version 1.11.15 or 1.12.7) contains a remotely exploitable heap overflow vulnerability; see this advisory from Stefan Esser for details. If you are running cvs with the "pserver" protocol, a quick upgrade is recommended (dropping pserver is also a very good idea for security-conscious sites).
Alerts:	Whitebox WBSA-2004:190-01 2004-06-10 Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1620 2004-06-02 Slackware SSA:2004-140-01 2004-05-19 Gentoo 200405-12 2004-05-20 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.022 2004-05-19 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:048 2004-05-19 Fedora FEDORA-2004-131 2004-05-19 Fedora FEDORA-2004-126 2004-05-19 SuSE SuSE-SA:2004:013 2004-05-19 Red Hat RHSA-2004:190-01 2004-05-19 Debian DSA-505-1 2004-05-19

Comments (none posted)

ethereal - multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	ethereal	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0176 CAN-2004-0365 CAN-2004-0367
Created:	March 29, 2004	Updated:	June 2, 2004
Description:	There are multiple vulnerabilities in versions of Ethereal earlier than 0.10.3. More information can be found in this advisory from ethereal.com and in this Eye on Security advisory.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-511-1 2004-05-30 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.015 2004-04-16 Red Hat RHSA-2004:137-01 2004-03-31 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:024 2004-03-30 Conectiva CLA-2004:835 2004-03-31 Red Hat RHSA-2004:136-01 2004-03-30 Netwosix NW-2004-0007 2004-03-29 Gentoo 200403-07 2004-03-28

Comments (none posted)

Filename disclosure vulnerability in fam

Package(s):	fam	CVE #(s):	CAN-2002-0875
Created:	August 19, 2002	Updated:	January 5, 2005
Description:	"fam" (file alteration monitor) watches files and directories for changes and lets interested applications know when something happens. This package has a flaw in its group handling that blocks some legitimate operations while, at the same time, exposing the names of files that should otherwise be invisible.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2005:005-01 2005-01-05 Debian DSA-154-1 2002-08-15

Comments (none posted)

flim: insecure file creation

Package(s):	flim	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0422
Created:	May 5, 2004	Updated:	December 16, 2004
Description:	The emacs "flim" mode creates temporary files in an insecure fashion, possibly allowing a local attacker to overwrite files.
Alerts:	Fedora FEDORA-2004-546 2004-12-15 Red Hat RHSA-2004:344-01 2004-08-18 Debian DSA-500-1 2004-05-01

Comments (none posted)

gtkhtml: malformed messages cause crash

Package(s):	gtkhtml	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0133 CAN-2003-0541
Created:	April 14, 2003	Updated:	April 18, 2005
Description:	GtkHTML is the HTML rendering widget used by the Evolution mail reader. GtkHTML supplied with versions of Evolution prior to 1.2.4 contain a bug when handling HTML messages. Alan Cox discovered that certain malformed messages could cause the Evolution mail component to crash.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-710-1 2005-04-18 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:093 2003-09-18 Conectiva CLA-2003:737 2003-09-12 Red Hat RHSA-2003:264-01 2003-09-09 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:046 2003-04-15 Red Hat RHSA-2003:126-01 2003-04-14

Comments (none posted)

heimdal: missing input sanitizing

Package(s):	heimdal	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0472
Created:	May 18, 2004	Updated:	May 27, 2004
Description:	Evgeny Demidov discovered a potential buffer overflow in a Kerberos 4 component of heimdal, a free implementation of Kerberos 5. The problem is present in kadmind, a server for administrative access to the Kerberos database. This problem could perhaps be exploited to cause the daemon to read a negative amount of data which could lead to unexpected behavior.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-23 2004-05-27 Debian DSA-504-1 2004-05-18

Comments (none posted)

icecast: denial of service

Package(s):	icecast	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 19, 2004	Updated:	May 19, 2004
Description:	The icecast server has a read error in its authorization code which can enable a denial of service attack; upgrading to version 2.0.1 fixes the problem.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-10 2004-05-19

Comments (none posted)

iproute: local denial of service

Package(s):	iproute net-tools	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0856
Created:	November 25, 2003	Updated:	December 14, 2004
Description:	The iproute utility is susceptible to spoofed netlink messages sent by local users, with the result that denial of service attacks are possible.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2004:148 2004-12-13 Fedora FEDORA-2004-154 2004-06-03 Fedora FEDORA-2004-115 2004-05-11 Debian DSA-492-1 2004-04-18 Gentoo 200404-10 2004-04-09 Red Hat RHSA-2003:316-01 2003-11-24

Comments (none posted)

racoon: failure to verify signatures

Package(s):	ipsec-tools racoon	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0155
Created:	April 7, 2004	Updated:	August 19, 2004
Description:	Versions of ipsec-tools prior to 0.2.5 contain a vulnerability wherein the racoon utility fails to verify digital signatures on some packets. This hole can lead to unauthorized connections or man-in-the-middle attacks. See this advisory for details.
Alerts:	Whitebox WBSA-2004:308-01 2004-08-19 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:027 2004-04-08 Gentoo 200404-05 2004-04-07

Comments (none posted)

racoon: denial of service vulnerability

Package(s):	ipsec-tools racoon iputils	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0403
Created:	April 26, 2004	Updated:	July 29, 2004
Description:	racoon does not check the length of ISAKMP headers. Attackers may be able to craft an ISAKMP header of sufficient length to consume all available system resources, causing a Denial of Service. This advisory contains additional details.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2004:308-01 2004-07-29 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:069 2004-07-14 Fedora FEDORA-2004-197 2004-06-28 Whitebox WBSA-2004:165-01 2004-06-10 Fedora FEDORA-2004-132 2004-05-19 Red Hat RHSA-2004:165-01 2004-05-11 Gentoo 200404-17 2004-04-24

Comments (none posted)

kdelibs: cookie disclosure

Package(s):	kdelibs	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0592
Created:	March 10, 2004	Updated:	August 24, 2004
Description:	kdelibs (and, thus, Konqueror) has a vulnerability where a hostile server can force the disclosure of cookies that should not be presented to it. KDE versions 3.1.3 and later contain a fix.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200408-23 2004-08-24 Red Hat RHSA-2004:074-01 2004-03-10 Red Hat RHSA-2004:075-01 2004-03-10 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:022 2004-03-10 Debian DSA-459-1 2004-03-10

Comments (none posted)

kde: URI Handler Vulnerabilities

Package(s):	kde Opera	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0411
Created:	May 17, 2004	Updated:	June 15, 2004
Description:	iDEFENSE identified a vulnerability in the Opera Web Browser that could allow remote attackers to create or truncate arbitrary files. The KDE team has found that similar vulnerabilities exists in all version of KDE, up to KDE 3.2.2 inclusive. See this advisory for more information.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-518-1 2004-06-14 Conectiva CLA-2004:843 2004-05-26 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:014 2004-05-26 Gentoo 200405-19 2004-05-25 Gentoo 200405-11 2004-05-19 Fedora FEDORA-2004-122 2004-05-19 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:047 2004-05-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-121 2004-05-17 Slackware SSA:2004-238-01 2004-05-17 Red Hat RHSA-2004:222-01 2004-05-17

Comments (none posted)

kdepim: VCF file information reader vulnerability

Package(s):	kdepim	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0988
Created:	January 15, 2004	Updated:	May 26, 2004
Description:	KDE has issued a security advisory for all versions of kdepim as distributed with KDE versions 3.1.0 through 3.1.4 inclusive. A carefully crafted .VCF file potentially enables local attackers to compromise the privacy of a victim's data or execute arbitrary commands with the victim's privileges. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CAN-2003-0988 to this issue.
Alerts:	Fedora FEDORA-2004-133 2004-05-19 Gentoo 200404-02 2004-04-06 Whitebox WBSA-2004:005-01 2004-02-12 Conectiva CLA-2004:810 2004-01-20 Slackware SSA:2004-014-01 2004-01-14 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:003 2004-01-14 Red Hat RHSA-2004:006-01 2004-01-07

Comments (none posted)

kernel: symlink overflow in the iso9660 filessytem

Package(s):	kernel	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0109
Created:	April 14, 2004	Updated:	July 15, 2004
Description:	The 2.4 and 2.6 kernels contain a vulnerability in the iso9660 (CDROM) filesystem which can be used by a local attacker to obtain root privileges. The exploit requires creating a specially-crafted filesystem and getting the kernel to mount it. Many systems are configured to automatically mount CDs on insertion, however, so the possibility of this vulnerability being exploited by users with physical access to the system is real. The 2.4.26 kernel contains the fix, which will also be merged into the upcoming 2.6.6 release.
Alerts:	Conectiva CLA-2004:846 2004-07-15 Red Hat RHSA-2004:106-01 2004-04-21 Red Hat RHSA-2004:105-01 2004-04-21 Debian DSA-489-1 2004-04-17 Debian DSA-491-1 2004-04-17 Debian DSA-479-2 2004-04-14 SuSE SuSE-SA:2004:009 2004-04-14 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:029 2004-04-14 Fedora FEDORA-2004-101 2004-04-14 Debian DSA-482-1 2004-04-14 Debian DSA-481-1 2004-04-14 Debian DSA-480-1 2004-04-14 Debian DSA-479-1 2004-04-14

Comments (none posted)

kernel - root exploit in MCAST_MSFILTER

Package(s):	kernel	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0424
Created:	April 22, 2004	Updated:	June 11, 2004
Description:	A locally exploitable integer overflow has been found the multicast code of the Linux kernel versions 2.4.22 to 2.4.25 and 2.6.1 - 2.6.3. A successful exploit could lead to full superuser privileges.
Alerts:	Whitebox WBSA-2004:183-01 2004-06-10 SuSE SuSE-SA:2004:010 2004-05-05 Slackware SSA:2004-119-01 2004-04-28 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:037 2004-04-27 Red Hat RHSA-2004:183-01 2004-04-22 Fedora FEDORA-2004-111 2004-04-22 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0022 2004-04-21

Comments (1 posted)

Linux kernel 2.2.10 failing function and TLB flush vulnerability

Package(s):	kernel-source-2.2.10	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0077
Created:	March 18, 2004	Updated:	June 4, 2004
Description:	A local root exploit is possible due to early flushing of the TLB.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-514-1 2004-06-04 Debian DSA-466-1 2004-03-18

Comments (none posted)

kernel-utils: setuid vulnerability

Package(s):	kernel-utils	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0019
Created:	February 7, 2003	Updated:	January 21, 2005
Description:	The kernel-utils package contains several utilities that can be used to control the kernel or machine hardware. In Red Hat Linux 8.0 this package contains user mode linux (UML) utilities. The uml_net utility in kernel-utils packages with Red Hat Linux 8.0 was incorrectly shipped setuid root. This could allow local users to control certain network interfaces, add and remove arp entries and routes, and put interfaces in and out of promiscuous mode. All users of the kernel-utils package should update to these packages that contain a version of uml_net that is not setuid root. Alternatively, as a work-around to this vulnerability issue the following command as root: chmod -s /usr/bin/uml_net
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2003:056-08 2003-02-07

Comments (none posted)

kolab: password disclosure

Package(s):	kolab	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 5, 2004	Updated:	May 27, 2004
Description:	Kolab stores passwords in plain text format, and these passwords can read from the underlying LDAP database. See this advisory for more information.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2004:052 2004-05-26 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.019 2004-05-05

Comments (3 posted)

LHA: stack buffer overflows and directory traversal flaws

Package(s):	LHA	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0234 CAN-2004-0235
Created:	April 30, 2004	Updated:	June 11, 2004
Description:	LHA is an archiving and compression utility for LHarc format archives. Ulf Harnhammar discovered two stack buffer overflows and two directory traversal flaws in LHA. See this advisory+patch for more details. CAN-2004-0234: An attacker could exploit the buffer overflows by creating a carefully crafted LHA archive in such a way that arbitrary code would be executed when the archive is tested or extracted by a victim. CAN-2004-0235: An attacker could exploit the directory traversal issues to create files as the victim outside of the expected directory.
Alerts:	Whitebox WBSA-2004:178-01 2004-06-10 Debian DSA-515-1 2004-06-05 Red Hat RHSA-2004:178-01 2004-05-26 Fedora FEDORA-2004-119 2004-05-11 Gentoo 200405-02 2004-05-09 Conectiva CLA-2004:840 2004-05-06 Slackware SSA:2004-125-01 2004-05-04 Red Hat RHSA-2004:179-01 2004-04-30

Comments (2 posted)

libpng: denial of service vulnerability.

Package(s):	libpng	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0421
Created:	April 29, 2004	Updated:	June 11, 2004
Description:	The PNG library can accesses memory that is out of bounds when creating an error message, this can be exploited by a malformed PNG image file.
Alerts:	Whitebox WBSA-2004:180-01 2004-06-10 Red Hat RHSA-2004:180-01 2004-05-19 Gentoo 200405-06 2004-05-14 Fedora FEDORA-2004-106 2004-05-05 Fedora FEDORA-2004-105 2004-05-05 Slackware SSA:2004-124-04 2004-05-02 Red Hat RHSA-2004:181-01 2004-04-30 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0025 2004-04-30 Debian DSA-498-1 2004-04-30 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:040 2004-04-29 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.017 2004-04-29

Comments (none posted)

libpng, libpng3: buffer overflow

Package(s):	libpng, libpng3	CVE #(s):	CAN-2002-1363
Created:	December 19, 2002	Updated:	July 14, 2004
Description:	Glenn Randers-Pehrson discovered a problem in connection with 16-bit samples from libpng, an interface for reading and writing PNG (Portable Network Graphics) format files. The starting offsets for the loops are calculated incorrectly which causes a buffer overrun beyond the beginning of the row buffer.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200407-06 2004-07-08 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.030 2004-07-06 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:063 2004-06-29 Whitebox WBSA-2004:249-01 2004-06-21 Fedora FEDORA-2004-176 2004-06-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-174 2004-06-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-175 2004-06-18 Fedora FEDORA-2004-173 2004-06-18 Red Hat RHSA-2004:249-01 2004-06-18 Conectiva CLA-2003:564 2003-01-23 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:008 2003-01-20 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.001 2003-01-15 Yellow Dog YDU-20030114-2 2002-01-14 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:0004 2003-01-14 Red Hat RHSA-2003:006-06 2003-01-09 Debian DSA-213-1 2002-12-19

Comments (none posted)

libxml2 - arbitrary code execution

Package(s):	libxml2	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0110
Created:	February 26, 2004	Updated:	August 19, 2009
Description:	Yuuichi Teranishi discovered a flaw in libxml2 versions prior to 2.6.6. When fetching a remote resource via FTP or HTTP, libxml2 uses special parsing routines. These routines can overflow a buffer if passed a very long URL. If an attacker is able to find an application using libxml2 that parses remote resources and allows them to influence the URL, then this flaw could be used to execute arbitrary code.
Alerts:	Fedora FEDORA-2009-8594 2009-08-15 Fedora FEDORA-2009-8582 2009-08-15 Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1324 2004-07-19 Conectiva CLA-2004:836 2004-03-31 Gentoo 200403-01 2004-03-06 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0010 2004-03-05 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.003 2004-03-05 Netwosix NW-2004-0004 2004-03-04 Debian DSA-455-1 2004-03-03 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:018 2004-03-03 Red Hat RHSA-2004:091-02 2004-03-03 Whitebox WBSA-2004:090-01 2004-03-01 Red Hat RHSA-2004:090-01 2004-02-26 Fedora FEDORA-2004-087 2004-02-25 Red Hat RHSA-2004:091-01 2004-02-26

Comments (none posted)

logcheck: symlink vulnerability

Package(s):	logcheck	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0404
Created:	April 21, 2004	Updated:	December 22, 2004
Description:	The logcheck utility handles temporary files in an unsafe way, possibly allowing local attackers to overwrite files.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2004:155 2004-12-22 Debian DSA-488-1 2004-04-16

Comments (none posted)

mailman denial of service

Package(s):	mailman	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0991
Created:	February 9, 2004	Updated:	May 25, 2004
Description:	Matthew Galgoci of Red Hat discovered a Denial of Service (DoS) vulnerability in versions of Mailman prior to 2.1. An attacker could send a carefully-crafted message causing mailman to crash. The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures project (cve.mitre.org) has assigned the name CAN-2003-0991 to this issue.
Alerts:	Conectiva CLA-2004:842 2004-05-25 Red Hat RHSA-2004:156-01 2004-04-14 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:013 2004-02-13 Red Hat RHSA-2004:019-01 2004-02-09

Comments (1 posted)

mc: multiple vulnerabilities

Package(s):	mc	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0226 CAN-2004-0231 CAN-2004-0232
Created:	April 29, 2004	Updated:	May 26, 2004
Description:	Midnight Commander has multiple vulnerabilities including buffer overflows, insecure temp files, and format string problems.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-21 2004-05-26 Red Hat RHSA-2004:172-01 2004-05-19 Slackware SSA:2004-136-01 2004-05-14 SuSE SuSE-SA:2004:012 2004-05-14 Red Hat RHSA-2004:173-01 2004-04-30 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:039 2004-04-29 Debian DSA-497-1 2004-04-29

Comments (none posted)

metamail: integer and buffer overflows

Package(s):	metamail	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0104 CAN-2004-0105
Created:	February 18, 2004	Updated:	May 21, 2004
Description:	Versions of metamail through 2.7 contain a set of integer and buffer overflows which are remotely exploitable via a properly crafted message.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-17 2004-05-21 Debian DSA-449-1 2004-02-24 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:014 2004-02-18 Slackware SSA:2004-049-02 2004-02-18 Red Hat RHSA-2004:073-01 2004-02-18

Comments (none posted)

mikmod: buffer overflow

Package(s):	mikmod	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0427
Created:	June 16, 2003	Updated:	June 16, 2005
Description:	Ingo Saitz discovered a bug in mikmod whereby a long filename inside an archive file can overflow a buffer when the archive is being read by mikmod.
Alerts:	Fedora FEDORA-2005-405 2005-06-16 Red Hat RHSA-2005:506-01 2005-06-13 Fedora FEDORA-2005-404 2005-06-09 Gentoo 200307-01 2003-07-02 Debian DSA-320-1 2003-06-13

Comments (none posted)

mod_python: denial of service vulnerability

Package(s):	mod_python	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0973
Created:	January 27, 2004	Updated:	October 4, 2004
Description:	Apache's mod_python module could crash the httpd process if a specific, malformed query string was sent. The Apache Foundation has reported that mod_python may be prone to Denial of Service attacks when handling a malformed query. Mod_python 2.7.9 was released to fix the vulnerability, however, because the vulnerability has not been fully fixed, version 2.7.10 has been released. Users of mod_python 3.0.4 are not affected by this vulnerability.
Alerts:	Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1325 2004-10-03 Conectiva CLA-2004:837 2004-04-12 Whitebox WBSA-2004:058-01 2004-03-01 Debian DSA-452-1 2004-02-29 Red Hat RHSA-2004:058-01 2004-02-26 Red Hat RHSA-2004:063-01 2004-02-26 Gentoo 200401-03 2004-01-27

Comments (none posted)

mozilla: multiple vulnerabilties

Package(s):	mozilla	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0594 CAN-2003-0564
Created:	March 10, 2004	Updated:	August 19, 2004
Description:	Mozilla 1.4 contains a few vulnerabilities, including disclosure of cookies to the wrong server, a scripting vulnerability which can allow an attacker to run arbitrary code, and an S/MIME vulnerability which can lead to remote denial of service or code execution attacks.
Alerts:	Whitebox WBSA-2004:421-01 2004-08-19 Whitebox WBSA-2004:110-01 2004-03-29 Red Hat RHSA-2004:112-01 2004-03-17 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:021 2004-03-10

Comments (none posted)

mpg321: format string vulnerability

Package(s):	mpg321	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0969
Created:	January 6, 2004	Updated:	March 28, 2005
Description:	A vulnerability was discovered in mpg321, a command-line mp3 player, whereby user-supplied strings were passed to printf(3) unsafely. This vulnerability could be exploited by a remote attacker to overwrite memory, and possibly execute arbitrary code. In order for this vulnerability to be exploited, mpg321 would need to play a malicious mp3 file (including via HTTP streaming).
Alerts:	Gentoo 200503-34 2005-03-28 Debian DSA-411-1 2004-01-05

Comments (none posted)

MySQL: temporary file vulnerabilities

Package(s):	mysql	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0381 CAN-2004-0388
Created:	April 14, 2004	Updated:	August 18, 2004
Description:	The mysqlbug and mysqld_multi scripts contain temporary file vulnerabilities which could be used by a local attacker to overwrite files on the system.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-20 2004-05-25 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:034 2004-04-19 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.014 2004-04-14 Debian DSA-483-1 2004-04-14

Comments (none posted)

neon: buffer overflow

Package(s):	neon	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0398
Created:	May 19, 2004	Updated:	September 30, 2004
Description:	The neon library (through version 0.24.5) contains a buffer overflow in its date parsing code, allowing arbitrary code execution when connecting to a hostile server. See this advisory for details. This vulnerability also affects related applications (such as cadaver).
Alerts:	Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1552 2004-09-29 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:078 2004-07-29 Gentoo 200406-03 2004-06-05 Gentoo 200405-25b 2004-06-02 Gentoo 200405-25 2004-05-30 Conectiva CLA-2004:841 2004-05-25 Gentoo 200405-15 2004-05-20 Gentoo 200405-13 2004-05-20 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.024 2004-05-19 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:049 2004-05-19 Fedora FEDORA-2004-130 2004-05-19 Fedora FEDORA-2004-129 2004-05-19 Red Hat RHSA-2004:191-01 2004-05-19 Debian DSA-507-1 2004-05-19 Debian DSA-506-1 2004-05-19

Comments (none posted)

Nessus NASL scripting engine security issues

Package(s):	nessus	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 27, 2003	Updated:	August 12, 2004
Description:	Some some vulnerabilities exsist in the Nessus NASL scripting engine. To exploit these flaws, an attacker would need to have a valid Nessus account as well as the ability to upload arbitrary Nessus plugins in the Nessus server (this option is disabled by default) or he/she would need to trick a user somehow into running a specially crafted nasl script. Read the full advisory for additional information.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200305-10 2003-05-27

Comments (none posted)

netpbm: insecure temporary files

Package(s):	netpbm	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0924
Created:	January 19, 2004	Updated:	December 29, 2004
Description:	netpbm is graphics conversion toolkit made up of a large number of single-purpose programs. Many of these programs were found to create temporary files in an insecure manner, which could allow a local attacker to overwrite files with the privileges of the user invoking a vulnerable netpbm tool.
Alerts:	Conectiva CLA-2004:909 2004-12-29 Gentoo 200410-02 2004-10-04 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:011-1 2004-09-27 Whitebox WBSA-2004:031-01 2004-02-12 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:011 2004-02-11 Red Hat RHSA-2004:030-01 2004-02-05 Fedora FEDORA-2004-068 2004-02-06 Red Hat RHSA-2004:031-01 2004-01-22 Debian DSA-426-1 2004-01-18

Comments (1 posted)

openssh: timing attack leads to information disclosure

Package(s):	openssh	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0190
Created:	May 2, 2003	Updated:	November 30, 2004
Description:	From the advisory: "During a pen-test we stumbled across a nasty bug in OpenSSH-portable with PAM support enabled (via the --with-pam configure script switch). This bug allows a remote attacker to identify valid users on vulnerable systems, through a simple timing attack. The vulnerability is easy to exploit and may have high severity, if combined with poor password policies and other security problems that allow local privilege escalation."
Alerts:	Ubuntu USN-34-1 2004-11-30 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2003.035 2003-08-06 Red Hat RHSA-2003:222-01 2003-07-29 Gentoo 200305-02 2003-05-13 Gentoo 200305-01 2002-03-05

Comments (1 posted)

OpenSSL: denial of service vulnerabilities

Package(s):	OpenSSL	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0081 CAN-2003-0851
Created:	March 17, 2004	Updated:	November 2, 2005
Description:	Versions 0.9.7a-c of the OpenSSL library suffer from two denial of service vulnerabilities; see the version 0.9.7d release announcement for details.
Alerts:	Red Hat RHSA-2005:830-00 2005-11-02 Red Hat RHSA-2005:829-00 2005-11-02 Fedora FEDORA-2005-1042 2005-10-31 Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1395 2004-05-08 Conectiva CLA-2004:834 2004-03-31 Whitebox WBSA-2004:084-01 2004-03-23 Red Hat RHSA-2004:084-01 2004-03-23 Fedora FEDORA-2004-095 2004-03-19 Whitebox WBSA-2004:120-01 2004-03-22 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0012 2004-03-17 Slackware SSA:2004-077-01 2004-03-17 Red Hat RHSA-2004:121-01 2004-03-17 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.007 2004-03-18 Gentoo 200403-03 2004-03-17 Debian DSA-465-1 2004-03-17 Netwosix NW-2004-0005 2004-03-17 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:023 2004-03-17 SuSE SuSE-SA:2004:007 2004-03-17 Red Hat RHSA-2004:120-01 2004-03-17 Red Hat RHSA-2004:119-01 2004-03-17 EnGarde ESA-20040317-003 2004-03-17

Comments (1 posted)

passwd: various problems

Package(s):	passwd	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 17, 2004	Updated:	June 2, 2004
Description:	Steve Grubb found some problems in the passwd program. Passwords given to passwd via stdin are one character shorter than they are supposed to be. He also discovered that pam may not have been sufficiently initialized to ensure safe and proper operation. A few small memory leaks have been fixed as well.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKSA-2004:045 2004-05-17

Comments (none posted)

postfix: denial of service vulnerabilities

Package(s):	postfix	CVE #(s):	CAN-2003-0468 CAN-2003-0540
Created:	August 5, 2003	Updated:	May 27, 2004
Description:	The postfix MTA, versions through 1.1.12 (but not 2.0) is subject to two remotely exploitable denial of service vulnerabilities; see this advisory from Michal Zalewski for details.
Alerts:	Mandrake MDKA-2004:028 2004-05-26 Trustix 2003-0029 2003-08-04 Mandrake MDKSA-2003:081 2003-08-04 EnGarde ESA-20030804-019 2003-08-04 Conectiva CLA-2003:717 2003-08-04 SuSE SuSE-SA:2003:033 2003-08-04 Red Hat RHSA-2003:251-01 2003-08-04 Debian DSA-363-1 2003-08-03

Comments (none posted)

Pound format string vulnerability

Package(s):	pound	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 18, 2004	Updated:	May 19, 2004
Description:	There is a format string flaw in Pound, allowing remote execution of arbitrary code with the rights of the Pound process.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-08 2004-05-18

Comments (none posted)

proftpd privilege escalation

Package(s):	proftpd	CVE #(s):
Created:	April 30, 2004	Updated:	May 19, 2004
Description:	A portability workaround was applied in version 1.2.9 of the FTP server ProFTPD. As a side-effect, CIDR based (aaa.bbb.ccc.ddd/NN) ACL entries in "Allow" and "Deny" directives act like an "AllowAll" directive and so FTP clients are granted access to files and directories although the server configuration might explicitly deny this. See this bug report.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-09 2004-05-19 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:041 2004-04-30 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.018 2004-04-30

Comments (none posted)

python: buffer overflow

Package(s):	python	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0150
Created:	March 10, 2004	Updated:	October 11, 2004
Description:	Python (versions 2.2 and 2.2.1 only) has a buffer overflow in the getaddrinfo() function which can be exploited by a malformed IPv6 address.
Alerts:	Debian DSA-458-3 2004-10-10 Gentoo 200409-03 2004-09-02 Debian DSA-458-2 2004-08-31 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:019 2004-03-09 Debian DSA-458-1 2004-03-09

Comments (none posted)

rsync remote file write attack

Package(s):	rsync	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0426
Created:	April 30, 2004	Updated:	July 12, 2004
Description:	See the rsync homepage for the April 2004 advisory: "There is a security problem in all versions prior to 2.6.1 that affects only people running a read/write daemon WITHOUT using chroot. If the user privs that such an rsync daemon is using is anything above "nobody", you are at risk of someone crafting an attack that could write a file outside of the module's "path" setting (where all its files should be stored). Please either enable chroot or upgrade to 2.6.1. People not running a daemon, running a read-only daemon, or running a chrooted daemon are totally unaffected."
Alerts:	Gentoo 200407-10 2004-07-12 Fedora FEDORA-2004-116 2004-07-01 Whitebox WBSA-2004:192-01 2004-06-10 Debian DSA-499-2 2004-06-02 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.025 2004-05-21 Red Hat RHSA-2004:192-01 2004-05-19 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:042 2004-05-10 Slackware SSA:2004-124-01 2004-05-02 Debian DSA-499-1 2004-05-01 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0024 2004-04-29

Comments (none posted)

subversion: buffer overflow

Package(s):	subversion	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0397
Created:	May 19, 2004	Updated:	May 21, 2004
Description:	Versions of the subversion source management package up to and including 1.0.2 suffer from a remotely exploitable buffer overflow vulnerability in their date parsing code; see this advisory for details. "Exploiting this vulnerability on not heavily protected servers is trivial even for beginners, therefore it is strongly recommended to update immediately."
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-14 2004-05-20 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.023 2004-05-19 Fedora FEDORA-2004-128 2004-05-19 Fedora FEDORA-2004-127 2004-05-19

Comments (none posted)

sysstat: temporary file vulnerability

Package(s):	sysstat	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0107 CAN-2004-0108
Created:	March 10, 2004	Updated:	October 4, 2004
Description:	The sysstat utility has a temporary file vulnerability which can be exploited by a local attacker to overwrite system files.
Alerts:	Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1372 2004-10-03 Gentoo 200404-04 2004-04-06 Debian DSA-460-2 2004-04-03 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0011 2004-03-16 Whitebox WBSA-2004:053-01 2004-03-10 Red Hat RHSA-2004:053-01 2004-03-10 Red Hat RHSA-2004:093-01 2004-03-10 Debian DSA-460-1 2004-03-10

Comments (none posted)

File overwrite vulnerability in tar and unzip

Package(s):	tar unzip	CVE #(s):	CAN-2001-1267 CAN-2001-1268 CAN-2001-1269 CAN-2002-0399
Created:	October 1, 2002	Updated:	April 10, 2006
Description:	The tar utility does not properly filter file names containing "../", meaning that a hostile archive can, if unpacked by an unsuspecting user, overwrite any file that is writable by that user. GNU tar versions 1.13.19 and earlier are vulnerable; unzip through version 5.42 has the same vulnerability.
Alerts:	Fedora-Legacy FLSA:183571-1 2006-04-04 Red Hat RHSA-2006:0195-01 2006-02-21 Conectiva CLA-2002:538 2002-10-29 Mandrake MDKSA-2002:066 2002-10-10 Mandrake MDKSA-2002:065 2002-10-10 EnGarde ESA-20021003-022 2002-10-03 Gentoo unzip-20021001 2002-10-01 Gentoo tar-20021001 2002-10-01 Red Hat RHSA-2002:096-24 2002-09-18

Comments (1 posted)

tcpdump: ISAKMP payload handling denial-of-service vulnerabilities

Package(s):	tcpdump	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0183 CAN-2004-0184
Created:	March 30, 2004	Updated:	September 30, 2004
Description:	TCPDUMP v3.8.1 and earlier versions contain multiple flaws in the packet display functions for the ISAKMP protocol. Upon receiving specially crafted ISAKMP packets, TCPDUMP will try to read beyond the end of the packet capture buffer and crash. More information is available in this Rapid7 advisory.
Alerts:	Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1468 2004-09-29 Whitebox WBSA-2004:219-01 2004-06-10 Red Hat RHSA-2004:219-01 2004-05-26 Fedora FEDORA-2004-120 2004-05-13 Slackware SSA:2004-108-01 2004-04-17 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:030 2004-04-14 OpenPKG OpenPKG-SA-2004.010 2004-04-07 Debian DSA-478-1 2004-04-06 Trustix TSLSA-2004-0015 2004-03-30

Comments (none posted)

Multiple vendor telnetd vulnerability

Package(s):	telnet Telnet netkit-telnet-ssl kerberos telnetd netkit-telnet nkitb/nkitserv/telnetd krb5	CVE #(s):
Created:	May 21, 2002	Updated:	October 5, 2004
Description:	This vulnerability, originally thought to be confined to BSD-derived systems, was first covered in the July 26th Security Summary. It is now known that Linux telnet daemons are vulnerable as well.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200410-03 2004-10-05 Yellow Dog YDU-20010810-2 2001-08-10 Yellow Dog YDU-20010810-1 2001-08-10 SuSE SuSE-SA:2001:029 2001-09-03 Slackware sl-997726350 2001-08-09 Red Hat RHSA-2001:100-02 2001-08-09 Red Hat RHSA-2001:099-09 2002-02-07 Red Hat RHSA-2001:099-06 2001-08-09 Progeny PROGENY-SA-2001-27 2001-08-14 Mandrake MDKSA-2001:093 2001-12-17 Mandrake MDKSA-2001:068 2001-08-13 HP HPSBTL0202-023 2002-02-12 Debian DSA-075-2 2001-08-14 Debian DSA-075-1 2001-08-14 Conectiva CLA-2001:413 2001-08-24 SCO Group CSSA-2001-030.0 2001-08-10

Comments (none posted)

utempter problems with symlink and strncpy

Package(s):	utempter	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0233
Created:	April 19, 2004	Updated:	June 11, 2004
Description:	Steve Grubb discovered two potential issues in the utempter program: If the path to the device contained /../ or /./ or //, the program was not exiting as it should. It would be possible to use something like /dev/../tmp/tty0, and then if /tmp/tty0 were deleted and symlinked to another important file, programs that have root privileges that do no further validation can then overwrite whatever the symlink pointed to. Several calls to strncpy without a manual termination of the string. This would most likely crash utempter.
Alerts:	Whitebox WBSA-2004:174-01 2004-06-10 Red Hat RHSA-2004:174-01 2004-05-26 Fedora-Legacy FLSA:1546 2004-05-18 Gentoo 200405-05 2004-05-13 Red Hat RHSA-2004:175-01 2004-04-30 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:031-1 2004-04-21 Fedora FEDORA-2004-108 2004-04-21 Slackware SSA:2004-110-01 2004-04-19 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:031 2004-04-19

Comments (none posted)

XChat 2.0.x SOCKS5 Vulnerability

Package(s):	xchat	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0409
Created:	April 19, 2004	Updated:	November 15, 2005
Description:	XChat is vulnerable to a stack overflow that may allow a remote attacker to run arbitrary code. The SOCKS 5 proxy code in XChat is vulnerable to a remote exploit. Users would have to be using XChat through a SOCKS 5 server, enable SOCKS 5 traversal which is disabled by default and also connect to an attacker's custom proxy server. This vulnerability may allow an attacker to run arbitrary code within the context of the user ID of the XChat client.
Alerts:	Fedora-Legacy FLSA:123013 2005-11-14 Red Hat RHSA-2004:585-01 2004-10-27 Netwosix NW-2004-0014 2004-05-01 Red Hat RHSA-2004:177-01 2004-04-30 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:036 2004-04-21 Debian DSA-493-1 2004-04-21 Gentoo 200404-15 2004-04-19

Comments (none posted)

xine-lib: malicious code execution

Package(s):	xine-lib	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0433
Created:	May 3, 2004	Updated:	May 28, 2004
Description:	A vulnerability exists in xine-lib where playing a specially crafted Real RTSP stream could run malicious code as the user playing the stream. More details can be found in this advisory. The problem has been fixed in xine-lib 1-rc4.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200405-24 2004-05-28 Slackware SSA:2004-124-03 2004-05-02

Comments (none posted)

xine-ui - insecure temporary file creation

Package(s):	xine-ui	CVE #(s):	CAN-2004-0372
Created:	April 6, 2004	Updated:	April 27, 2006
Description:	Shaun Colley discovered a problem in xine-ui, the xine video player user interface. A script contained in the package to possibly remedy a problem or report a bug does not create temporary files in a secure fashion. This could allow a local attacker to overwrite files with the privileges of the user invoking xine.
Alerts:	Gentoo 200404-20 2004-04-27 Slackware SSA:2004-111-01 2004-04-20 Mandrake MDKSA-2004:033 2004-04-19 Debian DSA-477-1 2004-04-06

Comments (none posted)

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